FWIW, I know there are major issues with IE3 (and probably N3 as well.) A minor part is table centering, but the big one is I've switched to PNG files. (Stupid software patent...) Shouldn't affect 4.0+ browsers though, and I've only had 2 v.3 visitors since I started tracking 3 months ago. (And I was one of them, from work.)

Perhaps you shd consider paid hosting to get the ugly oversized ad banner out of the way! hehe

Other than that, site looks pretty good.. except the "best" logo @ the bottom of your left menu looks rather "out of place"? And I think the text on the main box are too close to the borders, making the page look quite messy.

Ermm... may I confess.. after looking through your website, I still have no idea what a "Water-Cooled" Volkswagen is?? Am I stupid? Can I still live??

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Don't feel stupid... I'm here to help. The early VWs (Beetle, Thing, ...) have engines that are cooled by air (no radiator.) Starting with the Rabbit, VW switched to conventional "water" (antifreeze) engine cooling.

The "Best" logo is a rotating ad button. My only sponsor at the moment, so you can't really tell. I make that 120x60 hastily because he only had a full size banner. I think we're going to change it soon.

As for moving to a paid server, that's how I discovered this forum! Having just been sponsored by Best VW, I was poking around for a new home and have been eyeing a few providers I found here.

Once I move to my new home, I'll have to (want to) rewrite my pages for SSI anyhow, so I'll add space to the text then. Thanks for the suggestion!

and i like the vw background. it is subdued enough to not be annoying. my only gripe is that hi hate times on web pages. i don't know why. i just think it makes designs look sloppy. if it was a page with just text, it woudn't bother me.

Times? You mean, the date on my news? Perhaps I'll drop the date then and just date it in the news archive. Or do you mean the established date?

BTW, I've been using that background since I first created my regular VW page... 1996! (Good guess!) I need a tie-breaking opinion as to whether or not I should keep it. Anyone? (I could invert it so it was navy on a blue background if that made you feel better...

Switch to Verdana font to give it a quickie face lift, and change the electric blue frame. I know there is blue in the background and title graphic, but "that" blue distracts and looks unprofessional when carried through borders and frames. Try a more subdued blue - grey blue - or even a medium grey, something that would subtly define the content from the border. If you added a little cell padding to the content, it would look much cleaner and actually be easier to read. Consider also, a slightly subdued yellow for your links. Yellow on black can look a little garish if not tamed just a tad and you want it to serve as additional information to your main text. My eye was drawn first to the links.

As someone else mentioned, many don't know what a water-cooled-Volkswagen is. I would make the title graphic larger - at least as tall as the ad banner - and reserve the remaining real estate, above the fold, for a welcome for first time visitors or a brief description of your site goal. Perhaps include an image on the first page. Something to let them know what they're going to see here.

The load time was fine on a 56k connection. I think you've done a very nice job with this site and the content is really interesting. I hope my comments are not read as critical - I just took the time to look at it very objectively and pronounce my "opinions". We all want our sites to be optimal, so that's my take.

Are you still looking for a tie-breaker on that background graphic? I say lose it. Soon as I saw it I almost went for the back button. I'm trying to think of a better water image to use but nothings coming to me. Maybe use an image of one of these water cooled VW's instead maybe? I would make the site look a little more interesting. There's a lot of possibilities, and I'm sure sure the water theme is exploited them well enough.

Originally posted by akashik Are you still looking for a tie-breaker on that background graphic? I say lose it. Soon as I saw it I almost went for the back button. I'm trying to think of a better water image to use but nothings coming to me. Maybe use an image of one of these water cooled VW's instead maybe? I would make the site look a little more interesting. There's a lot of possibilities, and I'm sure sure the water theme is exploited them well enough.

Greg, are you talking about the page background (little blue vw symbol) or the water background in the title image? I just changed the title a bit, and messed with the link colors. I don't know... still doesn't feel right.

The problem with using a VW image is there are 12+ different models and I don't want to favor any one... silly I guess.